$340B spent on healthcare for hormone-disrupting chemicals

When it comes to taking care of your health, you know to eat a nutrient-dense diet, start (or stick with) an effective exercise routine, and get a good night’s sleep.

Now, you might not check each item off your list every single day.

But you can see the foods you’re putting in your body and the way they make you feel … you can see yourself in the mirror lifting a barbell and the resulting body transformation … and you can tell every morning whether you went to bed at the appropriate time and got a restful sleep.

In other words, you know that these are all variables in your lifestyle that are easily controllable … and they produce noticeable results.

Unfortunately, there are much-more-difficult factors to control. And those are ones not right in front of your eyes. Hidden dangers that don’t display an immediate threat … but that slowly destroy your body over time.

In the U.S., low-level but daily exposure to invisible, hazardous chemicals is wreaking havoc on the health of Americans.

I’m not talking about spending time at toxic waste sites or handling clearly unsafe materials. Rather, it’s ingredients found in everyday items like plastic bottles, metal food cans, detergents, flame retardants, toys, cosmetics, and pesticides that are impacting our health every single day.

And not just our health … but our pocketbooks as well.

The financial impact from exposure to these chemicals can be staggering.

A detailed economic analysis by researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center shows annual healthcare costs and lost earnings in the U.S. from these chemicals are now over $340 billion.

That’s more than 2.3% of the country’s GDP.

Here are some chemicals that you need to be aware of, as they disrupt your body’s endocrine system (which is responsible for regulating your hormones):

And mostly from neurological damage these chemicals cause in the unborn.

The Chemicals Aren’t
Easy to Avoid …

Bisphenol A (BPA) is commonly used to line tin food cans like fish, vegetables and soup.

Phthalates are used to make plastic food containers and various cosmetic products.

Polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB)-like polybrominated diphenyl ethers, or PBDE, are found in flame retardants in furniture and packaging.

The researchers included the chemicals chlorpyrifos and other organophosphates. These dangerous insecticides are said to have neurotoxic effects — in other words, they can inhibit the neurons in our brains from functioning properly.

But even as the damage and dollar amounts rise, there are some ways you can buy yourself some peace of mind.

‘Safe & Simple’ Steps to
Avoid Chemical Poisoning

Senior study investigator Teresa M. Attina, M.D., Ph.D., also of NYU Langone, says there are "safe and simple" steps families can take to limit exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals.

These include not microwaving food in plastic containers or covered by plastic wrap, and washing plastic food containers by hand instead of putting them in the dishwasher.

She says people can also avoid using plastic containers labeled on the bottom with the numbers 3, 6 or 7 inside the recycle symbol, in which chemicals such as phthalates are used. (See the symbols, and what they mean, here.)

Switching to all-natural or fragrance-free cosmetics is also an option.

Have you and your family already taken steps to reduce exposure to harmful chemicals found in everyday products?

Are you now considering checking what’s in the products you are currently using?

Either way, we would like to know your view of this issue by leaving a comment in the comment section below.

Happy and healthy investing,
Brad

Your thoughts on “$340B spent on healthcare for hormone-disrupting chemicals”

I bet that if we had a Free Market, instead of government regulations there were would be even more poisons in our food supply. As much as everyone wants to limit Big Government, regulations safeguarding our water and food supplies are very necessary

You need to take ownership of your health matters as the agencies that were suppose to look after all the related areas issues that you have pointed out are NOT looking after your best interests. Detoxify your body and protect your well being thru your immune system by providing the building blocks with Immunocal. information available @www.immunotec.com/david219392

Not that long ago I worked for one of the largest engineering and environmental consulting firms in the world. Another office in our company was hired by the federal govt to evaluate the impact of residual pharmaceutical drugs in our water supplies. I can tell you that our drinking water systems are not typically capable of removing these drugs from our public drinking water supplies (same for bottled water). And…their presence is RARELY evaluated. Such is not required by the Clean Water Act and local purveyors rarely go there. Anyhow, I was told that our scientists discovered a broad array of drugs in our water systems, albeit at very low levels. The impacts of this are unknown but it is suspected that the very wide presence of estrogen (specifically) in our water supplies could be having a significant impact. And you can imagine what that impact is without too much imagination. Because of the sensitive nature of the findings……the project was cancelled by the client.

It would be nice if we could all return to an agrarian society where all foods were freshly grown, harvested or processed without the need for storage and transfer (not to mention fertilizers, pesticides, etc.). Unfortunately, that is not the world in which most of us in the US actually reside. How would the cities of NY, LA, Houston, Chicago, Dallas, etc. feed themselves as there is no substantial area for agricultural use? Obviously by transporting foods from other areas with all the negatives that entails. I an not endorsing endocrine disruptors, but other than saying they are bad, what alternatives for storage/transfer modularities are you proposing?

I have a simple question, why do they use these particular chemicals in the first place? I happened to give up on anything in a tin can years ago, but why do manufacturers line the can with a hormone degenerating chemical in the first place? Is there some kind of trade off?

This is a critical health issue for anyone who cares about what chemicals are invading our bodies in a silent but deadly manner. Health experts regard endocrine disruption as one of the major health issues we face, and the chemical and food industries are trying their best to turn the other cheek. And they will do so if we let them. It’s up to all of us to safeguard our health, both individually and publicly, and not let money and/or convenience rule what happens to our bodies…